


So We've Come To This

by RussianEmpress



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, Multi, Other, Others to come!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-05
Updated: 2016-12-12
Packaged: 2018-07-12 10:05:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,367
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7098337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RussianEmpress/pseuds/RussianEmpress
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Ex-Junkers have now been invited to join Overwatch. And as everyone knows, Junkrat and Roadhog aren't the two most pleasant or easiest people to become friends with. JunkratxMercy</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I made this for a friend who's art of Junkrat and Mercy have made me fall in love with the pairing. Plus this is a great excue to finally get a chance to write some Overwatch ficy goodness. And there just isn't enough OW fanfics out there right now to satisfy my needs! 
> 
> Enjoy!

A pattern had developed in the doctor’s examination room. It was starting to annoy the rest of the small band of nurses in the clinic. 

There was peaceful silence, only the gentle hum of electric equipment and the steady rhythms on soft padded shoes very rarely shuffling around the polished floors. Then the “CLANK” happened one at first, so suddenly, many of the staff jumped out nearly out their skins. But it passes, and when nothing followed the noise up, not even a phone’s ring to disrupt the peace again, everyone went back to their work.  
CLANK….CLUNK. CLANK CLANK. CLUNK. CLANK CLUNK. CLANK CLUNK. CLANK CLUNK. CLANK CLUNK.

A flocks of nurses in scrubs sprinted down the hall of the sudden banging of metal on metal. If a piece of hardware was malfunctioning, that wan crises they could handle. If it was something more threatening, like a terrorist group bent on the destruction of the new Overwatch medical base, that was another. 

The banging grew louder and faster, and when they all finally made it to the source of the commotion, some of their hands ready at the switch to call out an emergency cry for help on their devices, they were met with a young man. He looked so utterly board that when his golden speckled eyes rolled over to gaze at them lazily, he was so unimpressed by the lot of those young clean faces, eager to assist and help, he continued to swing his metal (and incredibly shoddy looking) prosthetic leg up,-CLANK- and allowed gravity to swing it back down-CLUNK- against the examination table he was currently sitting on. An amused grin pulled half his lips up, and he bared his sharp teeth at them. How cute. They all looked disgusted at him, their crinkled noses and hard judgmental stares were not subtle. 

They observed his covered in ash pale skin, and how the skin around his shoulders were a mismatch color from the rest of his barely tanned parts. Whatever was always lying on them, when removed, gave him the worst farmer’s tan ever. His patchy works of hair tuffs that were singed at the tips, and while only sporting a pair of faded printed army pants that were so ripped and sewed up with random patches and symbols, he truly looked like a homeless mad man. They all disapproved of his unkempt looks. They said nothing (because they were ordered not to) about his mismatched and unofficial prosthetic limbs. Not just his comical pirate-like-peg-leg, but his arm piece that looked rusty and had paint chips falling off it. None of them could stand his personal odor of day old smoke and stale gun powder for too long, either as they started to file out of the room or breathe through their mouths. Junkrat hunched himself over, now all too board with everyone, as his self-made cybernetic arm met his chin and he swung his leg up again, CLANK, and back down CLUNK. 

“It’s Morse code.” He said, in an airy Australian accent that was so thick, it really came out more like “Iss muoorss cood.” 

“For, “Where the Hell did you wankers put me very large friend”, eh? Also, how much longer do I gotta sit here for?” 

Some of the nurses stared in awe, some of them had never heard an authentic Australian accent before, not in personal at least. Some of these nurses were clearly too young to have been born before the Omnic Crises that completely destroyed nearly half of Australia itself and finding an actual Australian was rare. Especially in these parts of the world.

Nobody answered him, there hungry eyes for both the weird and the freaky, roamed all over his form and they didn’t even know what to say. His eyes rolled so hard up and around his sockets, it looked physically painful. His bizarrely skinny, yet finally muscled, bird cage of a chest heaved up and back down and he breathed out all his annoyance. 

“’Yah can’t miss ‘im. Seven feet tall? 800 pounds of pure man meat? Kinda got a whole scary leather boar piggy mask thingy covering his ugly mug, eh? Yeah? Ring any bells, hmm?”  
More silence. More blank stares. More judgmental observation. 

He pitched the bridge of his nose with his flesh hand, his black coated fingernails caught the florescent light from above. This man’s appearance just kept building itself stranger and stranger by the moment. 

“Right then. I think I’ve ‘ad just about enough of this then. If you won’t talk, I’ll go lookin’ around for me self.” He hoped off the table, his peg leg hitting the floor first. It was longer than his other leg, being self-made, it wasn’t surprising he miscalculated the proper length. He shoved a fingerless gloved hand in the depths of his pants pocket, and everyone jumped away and gasped at the small hand-made bomb he pulled out. 

“Clearin’ some space would be most helpful.” He laughed and laughed and his thumb flipped a little silver cover on the prop in his fingers. 

Small and almost toy looking, it was sure enough the real thing, with a little metal box that had some tiny wires poking out of it. How he got passed security with it in this clinic of ALL places, would forever be a mystery, but here he was, holding it out to them.  
The group of nurses split like the Red Sea of biblical times, when a white angel rounded through the door, data pads in hand and midair, bright blue light fell on her fair features and blond hair. Her cybernetic back struts whirled and clicked supporting her metallic white wings that were tucked carefully behind her. Her white armor was clean and spotless, and the other younger members of the staff glowed in her presences. She was clearly the one in charge her. A suit…without actually wearing a suit. The blond man glared at her under his thick eyebrows, eyes and fingers becoming a little too twitchy for everyone’s taste. 

“ _Hälsningar Herr_.Greetings Mr….” She said, an accent of Swedish heritage lifting touching each word gently. She flickered a glance at her data screen and caught his last name. “Fwakes”. She snapped her heels together and smiled genially down at the ember dusted man.

“Goodness.” She said simply when her glance came upon his open palm, clearly recognizing the threat he bared. Yet she didn’t back up in fear like the others, instead she held out her hand, like a mother to a naughty child who was handling the classroom hamster too roughly. Her smile promised him he would get to play with the classroom pet again later, but her straight posture and strong demanding hand assured him that she would do everything in her power to make him comply if he decided to be fussy.  
‘Mr. Fwakes’ did a perfect imitation of a buzzer on a game show, when the player gave the wrong answer. He crossed his arms like that of his skull and dynamite tattoo on his shoulder, and squinted his beady eyes at the new doctor. He eyed her golden halo and wings, and suddenly became very distrustful of doctor who clearly held such a high opinion of themselves that they dressed like a fucking angel. 

“’Is ‘Junkrat’. Call me “Mr. Fwakes” again, and I’ll put a landmine so fast under dos fancy black heels of yours, even I won’t be able to see it comin’ down. Just you going up. In different directions.” He giggled at his gruesome threat, smile breaking his thin features again. He flicked closed the little box back up, and in a swift gesture, slipped it back in his pants pocket. The doctor withdrew her hand and smiled back at him, joylessly. It was a very anticlimactic draw of a very simple power play.

“I am the Chef of Medical here, and I would like to be the first one to welcome you to Overwatch. _Välkommen_. You may call me Mercy.” Her large blue eyes opened, those long black lashes parting like a rising theater curtain. She chuckled and waved the others off. Some asked if she was sure, and with a wave of her covered hand, they scampered off. The head doctor knew how to take care of herself, bomb threat mere inches away from her, or not. Junkrat raised a wild eyebrow at her. Mercy? She not only paraded herself around like an angel, but she called herself Mercy? Now that was ballsy, even by Junkrat’s standards. If he even had standards. 

“Yeah…yeah o’ight.” Junkrat had been somewhat unofficially recruited into this Overwatch 2.0, AKA, Post World Wide Apocalypse, AKA, World War 6, AKA, a bunch of people that he didn’t know where fighting a bunch of people he didn’t like so he might as well let this little team supply him with new equipment and ammo on their shiny dollar while he “helped” them make them bombs. Or fight terrorists. Whatever. Junkrat stopped listening to the old man in the red visor after he promised him and his friend that if they helped Overwatch, they would be granted asylum. Blah blah blah, fine print, blah blah, Junkers red tape would be washed out, blah blah I’m old and cranky and need a nap, sign here and get out of my sight. 

…That’s pretty sure what Junkrat remembered was what the Soldier guy said when he and his little bodyguard came to the meeting point a few days prior. Speaking of which.

“Oi, Lady Whirlybird. Where’s my pal?”

“It’s Mercy.” She corrected kindly. “I don’t call you the “F” word, and you call me by name, _ja_? Yes?”

He grinned at her. Ah. Some wit in this blondie. She looked over at her information again.

“Ah. Yes. One Mr. Mako Rutledge.” Her delicate Swedish tongue butchered the correct pronunciation of his partner’s name. 

Junkrat stuck out his tongue in displeasure. 

“Ugh. Don’t be callin’ him that neither. It’s Roadhog.”

Mercy nodded, tapped a few things on the mid-air flickering screen and closed it after her informational update. 

“Like you, he is in his own waiting room for his proper checkup. Just standard procedure.” 

“Pfft, good luck with that. What ya gonna do? Ask him to turn his head and cough?!” Junkrat twitched harshly and began to laugh at imaginary sight of Roadhog, this monster of a man, a violent murderer and killer, just like himself, listening to a tiny little doctor, to someone as meek and tiny like Mercy and following orders. 

“He will.” She walked toward Junkrat and placed her long fingers on his collarbone. He stopped laughing at the sudden contact and looked down at her. Her hand was slender, tightly guarded with white high polistic plastic metal armor and black leather. She was dwarfed under him, even in her heels. His impressive height of six feet and six inches didn’t seem to intimidate Mercy in the slightest. She then pushed upon him, her palm lying flat against his chest and Junkrat was shoved back to sit on the table top again.

“If he wants to get paid that is.” Mercy said. She turned to the side, rummaged for some supplies and cheerfully said to him.

“ _Väldigt bra_. Very good. Now if you would, Mr. Junkrat, if you too, would like to get paid as one of Overwatch’s newest recruits, please be so kind as to turn your head and cough.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, I wanted to write a chapter a day, but it might be a chapter a week. Work is crazy busy. Hence why I'm posting this at 1 AM. Eeesh!
> 
> THANK YOU for all the kudos. It's the only thing that keeps me going. And my love for Junkrat and Mercy. Yeah!
> 
> Enjoy!

She was composed and calm. So much so that it was driving the naturally twitchy and jittery Ex-Junker’s mouth to fill up with his own blood. His sharp teeth chewed on the inside of his cheeks as her hands gently glided over his arm to check for a proper pulse and up his neck. Those cold long nimble fingers poke and nudged certain points all over his limps (or rather what remained of his authentic limbs) and her neatly trimmed eyebrows went up every time she approved of what she felt.

Junkrat was certain he was going to ball up his metal fist and slam it into her perfectly symmetrical face if she muttered “ _Ja_. Yes. Very good” one more time under her peppermint scented breath. Her calm was going to drive him over the edge. He was about to snap at her to fuck off when she clutched the back of his head and started to maneuver him to the left and right, Junkrat absolutely hating the feeling of someone, anyone, man handling him. He could turn his own damn head. 

He didn’t give two spits if it was a trained professional, or doctor, or ‘teammate’, or whoever. He even snapped and snarled at his own bodyguard like a rabid canine when he used to reach over to help Junkrat up, or down, or whatever when his make shift leg malfunctioned, or when a thug with incredibly good aim managed to nick the connection point between his arm and elbow, rendering his right arm useless. Roadhog tried to steady the hobbling young man out once and was thanked with a small yet wickedly sharp piece of barbed wire in his meaty palm. 

Junkrat never apologized for stabbing him and Roadhog never tried to steady him again. And they left it at that. 

If Junkrat had a conscious anymore, it would tell him to relax and let the woman do her job. But that voice had long ago been snuffed out by breathing in too much sulphuric acid and getting a healthy dose of nuclear waste radiation seeping into his brain at one point too. So he bite her. 

“Yeeaa!” Mercy yelped, reeling back her hand, not because she was harmed. Junkrat may have been 45% cybernetic, but his jaw was still human, and those sugar stained human teeth were not about to actually bite through her armor clad fingers. But she was genially surprised. She felt Junkrat begin to squirm and tighten under her examination, she had seen this behavior a hundred times over. She had much, much worse patients too, but it had been ages since someone actually managed to clamp down on her. He sprang like a Jack-in-the-Box, quick and without warning. 

Junkrat also wasn’t a fussy child. Or she didn’t think him to be, but now she wasn’t so sure. Especially now that he started to giggle and snort at her expense. To his displeasure, she didn’t let it shock her for another moment longer. Her other hand rubbed the other’s fingers, again, not because it hurt or the armor was broken, but more out of memory of habit. From the times before when she wasn’t on 24 hour doctor shifts in battle armor. It was so long ago…

She smiled. His giggling dried up, as most little boys do when their victims paid them no mind, and she asked, 

“Apologias. Did I strike a damaged area? Did I cause you discomfort?” 

He should have punched her. 

Junkrat snarled at her, for no other reason than being copped up her for too long and her being too goodie goodie for his tastes. 

“All this really necessary? I’m either functioning, or I ain’t. And I is, so just check that box off yer chart. No need to go poking and prodding.” 

“Proper procedure, Mr. Junkrat. But if you preferred I stopped, we can take a break.”

He shot off the table again, hands grabbing the side and pushing himself off, hopping like a jackrabbit away from the thing. 

“I said I’m fine.”

Mercy wouldn’t be undermined so quickly. 

“But there is still blood work to draw, and X-rays to take, and-

“I’m _fine_. Been fine for 20 years. Gonna continue being fine. Now either you be a good ‘ittle shelia and show me out and to my pal, or I will.”

Mercy did not forget about the minute bomb in Junkrat’s pocket, or whatever else he had snuck in here. She held her hands up in surrender brought her commlink on the side of strange halo head piece. She tapped the side of it and spoke to whoever was on the other line. 

“Is Mr. M-

“Roadhog.” Junkrat blurted out, correcting her, hands on his hips like a stern teacher. Her eye quivered. This Junkrat was coming to close to being rude, and she had very little tolerance for that. But Winston and the other administrators warned her the two new Ex-Junker additions to the team were to be handled with care. They needed them to help Overwatch, the much finer details of HOW were not relayed to her, but they assured her, it was important. She, and ultimately the others, needed to keep them from running off. She couldn’t deny Winston’s incredibly discrete joy in his mood and attitude when he came to her, all 600 pounds of fierce gorilla stood proudly, chest out, and announced that two new members were going to join them in making the world a better place. He peeked over the rims of his glasses at their profiles, not a hint of judgement in him as he looked over their profile photos. He didn’t care that they were actually prison mugshots. All Winston cared about was that the team would get bigger and stronger for it.

Mercy sighed. Even her sigh sounded like a breeze a top the Swedish Alps in the spring morning. Junkrat was about to scream. 

“Is ’Roadhog’ finished with his exam?” She nodded and pulled her hand away from her halo. 

“Come then.” She said and summoned up her data pads in mid-air again. “We will finish this later. Your friend is ready.” 

She went out the room and Junkrat had no choice but to follow her. He had no idea where he was, had a lousy sense of direction, and he hated being inside hospitals. He was more likely to just jump out a window just so he could get away from the white and clean hallways and just hope Roadhog was eventually bust out himself and meet up with him in the city as they have so many other times. So he fell in step with the doctor, not paying any mind to the people who greeted the head President Medical Doctor Lady, or whatever he title was, who all then noticed his slouching form behind her and avoided their gaze. Junkrat just rolled his eyes. Stupid normal people…just cause they all had fancy cybernetic limbs that matched their other arm or leg, was no reason for them to look at him like he was any less better. They would all kill over if they had any idea just how much money he was swimming in after a heist…or what was left after buying ammo, chemicals, wires, timers, gun powered, transports, chains, clickers, off sets, springs, glue, lots and lots of glue…whatever! He was still no less good than these cleaned up nurses and other doctors in their silly smiling squirrel scrubs. How they annoyed him. 

His head cocked to the side suddenly. A thought skittering across his brain, a vision of a brand new arm and leg, ones that matched and didn’t break on sudden impacts. A welcoming gift from these Overwatch ‘Heroes.’, all on their dime. Yeah. Yeah that would be swell. An image of his cleaned up face and slicked back hair on the cover of magazines, like that Jack guy, the one with the perfectly sculpted face and blond hair, like his. Whole cities thanking him and even his enormous friend for their services. For their good deeds. His mood had been sour, but it was uplifted with the fantasy running rampant inside his head. He couldn’t help by snigger at the thought. 

“Doctor Ziegler! Be careful!”

A nurse ran up to her, throwing himself between her and Junkrat as she turned to look over her shoulder at the yelled out warning. Her wings deployed, her whole calm demeanor revved up to action and caution. It was Junkrat’s turn to be caught off guard when they ‘flapped’ and a bright warm glow sprung from them. He had seen his share of flying cyborgs or levitating people, but when Mercy’s feet left the ground, only a few inches up, it was certainly a sight to see in person. It was so graceful it was almost eerie. 

The Ex-Junker took stance himself, bending over in his cause attack mood, and then realized he had been stripped of his frag launcher and rip-tire. He still had a few miniature bombs and sticks of dynamite hidden on his person, and a hollowed out molar with nitroglycerin in it for the most extreme cases, but nothing that would be too much help to Mercy if they were about to get into an actual fight in such a tight space. How embarrassing that his delicate doctor teammate was going to show him up like this in their first shared fight. 

“Vat! Vat iz it!” Her accent running wild, her head swerving, eyes darting to and fro, looking for the danger, trying to calculate how to protect everyone.  
“There’s a mutated corpse right behind you!” 

Junkrat stared blankly at the nurse, who with all sincerity was actually accusing Junkrat to be some sort of walking dead thing. Rumors had indeed traveled all over the world that Austrians were turned into flesh eaters after the fall out of the bomb. Some grew wings from the mutation of the radiation. Somehow the myth of vampires became mixed in it all, and Junkrat couldn’t remember if Aussies now turned into bats or just couldn’t go into the sunlight.

The silence between everyone who was earshot in the clinic was deafening. Nobody would have had their torsos attached any longer if Roadhog heard that. The nurse defending Mercy was young. Too young and too stupid looking to be mocking Junkrat in such a manner. But the older ones who did not escape Junkrat’s sight just beyond the check in counter, where smiling at their idiot peer. Whoever had bet that he young boy was going to actually jump at the chance to protect Mercy and gain her favor must have been counting his wad of cash down the hall by now. It must have been easy to convince the trainee when the other frat doctors must have pointed at Junkrat and said he was one of the Junkers from the Outback.  
Junkrat stared at them for a moment longer. Never mind. He was going to set this whole place on fire the second he and Roadhog stepped foot outside. He wasn’t cut out for ‘helping’ people.

Mercy had deployed a staff at one point, a long bo staff that two gold beams danced around each other at the top of it. It surged with energy, it’s computer panels lifting up and down like it was breathing. It looked like it could kill anything with one swift swing. Or at least knock someone very hard at the back of the head. Which is what she did to the young student in front of her. She clunked her staff down at him, he yelped in pain, his arms coming up to cover his soft stupid skull. 

“ _Jag kan inte tro det._ I can’t believe this...”She muttered under her breath. Her wings flapped once more, she descended down, her heels clicked on the floor as the projectile feathers folded back behind her. Her staff’s energy died, and stopped spinning. She looked annoyed, and just as Junkrat thought he was going to lunge at the idiot, just so he could finally punch something since he wasn’t allowed to blow anything up in the middle of a hospital, he burst out laughing instead. All pent up sudden rage, becoming moot when Mercy smacked him. 

”You,” she looked down her nose at the boy, meanly and unkind, not at all how she looked as she carefully looked over Junkrat’s frame. ”Will apologize to Jamison, a member of Overwatch and show him and all heroes alike respect. You, and the rest of your group are on jordan placement.” 

She snapped an arm out and he scampered off. The other group of doctors mysteriously disappeared before Mercy had a chance to execute a proper sentences. 

”Oh, I am sorry, _min vän_ , my friend. Forgive them, for they are young. And impressionable. And stupid.” She smiled at Junkrat. 

Junkrat looked like he didn’t care, fingernails with soot under them scratched at the side of his neck. 

”What the hell is jordan placement?” He asked, he had never heard of that. Although to be fair, he didn’t know any real medical terms. It wasn’t his field or interest. 

She brushed a long strand of blond hair out of her face. 

”Bedpan duty.” 

Junkrat howled in laughter. When he stopped he whipped at his eyes and called out to her back, 

”Oi. Told you not to call me that.”

” _Nej._. You said not to call you Fawkes.” She didn’t allow him time to respond as she turned to her left and went into the open exam door. Junkrat rounded into the room a second later and smiled joyfully as Roadhog leaned against the wall, tree trunks for arms crossed over his chest. He was also missing his padded blast armor and other goodies. That hideous leather mask was still strapped on his face. 

A tiny man with huge dreadlocks that looked more like underground electricity cables, thick and long, than actual locks of hair stood with his own data pad down below Roadhod’s waist line. If Junkrat had thought Mercy was meek and small, this guy didn’t even reach Mercy’s slender shoulders.

He looked up when Mercy made her presences known, watching Junkrat take uneven steps up behind her. The short man’s clear lime green visor shined under the lights and he smiled all friendly like at them both. He rolled over, yes, Junkrat noticed he glided on the tops of his feet because they were actual foot lightrails, rather than a proper ped prosthetic. 

His voice, as warm as the Brazilian beach it hailed from, welcomed Junkrat and he extended a gloved hand to him. 

“Pleasure, friend! What’s good! I’m-…wait, wait. Let me guess who you are first.” 

Junkrat didn’t like normal people much, but he certainly didn’t like celebrities all that better. He had seen this him before, some DJ that took down some Vishkar Corporations, which was all fine and good in Junkrat’s book, but something about his upbeat charm wasn’t rubbing one him like it was supposed to. 

The man looked up, in thought, hand petting the little goatee that was trying very hard to grow out his young face and out of his smooth chin. 

“Hmmm…Blond. Check. Skinny. Check. Tattoo. Che-By that way, love the tat.” He interrupted himself and flashed Junkrat his left arm, showing off his black inked tribal frog with. Junkrat had to squint at it to make it out, it looked more like messed up tire track with an animal caught under it. Not nearly as threatening or dangerous looking at his own tattoo of a flaming jolly roger skull and lit dynamite sticks, but, hey, he could at least respect the other man for going under the needle. 

“And that rosy completion of ash. You must be Junkrat.” He looked up at Roadhog behind him, still leaning, and he elbowed him a few times in his huge gut. 

“He’s just as you described him, big fella.” Roadhog haled his huge shoulders up in a shrug and nodded. A muffled “Yup” came from that stitched, warthog nosed mask. 

That gloved hand came back out in front of Junkrat. When Junkrat didn’t take it, Lucio scurried right up next to him, had to jump a little as he did and threw a well sculpted strong arm over his shoulders. Lucio’s metallic torso and legs weighted a ton, and once he locked his arm over Junkrat, the Aussie was forced to bend down to his level. 

“I’m…dramatic pause…Lucio. AKA, DJ Lucio. AKA, international freedom fighter and super famous maker of music, love, and peace, I know, all at the same time, how does he do it!? AKA Dr. Feels Good All The Time. And last but not least, AKA, the best dressed on the team, excluding you Mercy, of course.” He flashed her his perfect pearly white smile. Junkrat tried to lean away from him, those dreads smacking him in the face, but when he couldn’t, he was amazed at what a strong grip the tiny man had. 

She sighed, tired of his joy almost as much as Junkrat and presented him with a show of her hand, a proud display of man and machine before them. 

“This is Lucio. He is not “officially” a doctor-“

“YO!” 

“BUT! He is highly advanced in the study of the medical field and like many of us on the team, has converted his own weaponry for his own purposes. And like myself, he acts on his impulse to help and heal. I thank him for that everyday. It was hard to be the only medic on the team. He is an amazing asset to Overwatch.

Lucio sheepishly kicked the black tips of his lightrails at the ground. 

“Aw shucks.” He said and grinned.

“And I will thank you now for attending to, erm, Roadhog here.” She turned her attention finally to the literal elephant sized man in the room. 

“And how are you feeling, Mr. Roadhog? _Allt är bra_ All is good?” 

Roadhog looked down at everyone. He was only a head or two taller than Junkrat, when the crazed man wasn’t slumped over, but he towards over the two medics. They looked up at him as if he was some sort of deity, about to pass judgment over man kind. 

Roadhog cracked his neck, rolling it side to side, then crack his back when he rolled his shoulders. He threw up a thumb and grunted. 

”Alright!” Lucio hooted and shot Roadhog two of his own thumbs up. He turned to Mercy again. 

”All clear here, doc.”

She nodded and smiled. She tapped Roadhog on his forearm, like petting a new puppy, and clasped her hands over her chest. 

” _Underbar_ Wonderful. And with that, please, we must meet up with Winston, as was promised after we were finished her. Please, follow us. I can not wait for you two to meet the rest of Overwatch.”

Lucio winked at them and glided after Mercy as she made her exit down another clean white hallway. Greenlight jumped from the back of Lucio’s feet and Junkrat watched light fade as he skated out of sight. It was one hell of a way to make an exit. 

”Well mate, looks like you at the musical dingo got all chummy there, eh? Great. Good. I’m glad. You can be his bodyguard too, I guess. Dunno how this team thing works.” He said, mocking and sneering at the fact that Roadhog was actually cordial to another human being that wasn’t himself. He wasn’t jealous, he just didn’t have friends. Just one, and that’s all he needed, and he had to pay Roadhog to stick around... And now he was going to have to play nice with a bunch of other strangers. Two of which were far too calm and too joyous to be around for too long. 

How the hell was he ever going to to fit into this ’team.’ 

Without looking at his face, not that it mattered if he did, it was hidden behind that boiled black leather, Junkrat said skeptically, 

”What’s with the smile?” 

Roadhog held a tiny red ruby on a stick between two massive ringed fingers. Junkrat bulked at the man’s well earned lollipop and laughed madly. Ok, maybe the frog man wasn’t too bad. 

Not too bad at all.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the kudos. <3 I wish I could kudos you all back.

Obediently, which was a word either Junkrat or Roadhog had EVER used in the past decade or so, the two men followed Mercy and Lucio down the bright lit hallway to this Winston fella. 

Both Ex-Junkers recalled the name, he was the man that kept trying to get in contact with them, with endless inquiries about joining the oh-so-fancy Overwatch team. The two cons didn’t much care about what the first message entailed, a lot of crap about helping out the world, stopping gangs and hooligans from terrorizing normal citizens, ect, ect. Junkrat thought it was a joke at first, as did Roadhog, as they were literally in the middle of a heist get away when they reserved the first message. It was sorted away under junk mail shortly after skimming it as they rode at 180 mph in Roadhog’s M5 engine costume bike. 

“Next they’ll be askin’ for our kidneys and ten cents a day to fed the *kiddiwinks!!” Junkrat yelled to the wind. Roadhog laughed, revved the engine handle and they shot off. The cops, a burnt down retirement home, and wailing ambulances, miles behind them, aflame. 

Five messages later, the promise of a rather healthy bi-WEEKLY check, and a run in with that annoying old man who had nothing better to do than track them down so he could negotiate with them in person.(Winston was a disembodied voice on a speaker commlink Solider 76 provided back then). Junkrat and Roadhog just up and agreed. They talked it over for a good three minutes and shrugged in Soldier’s direction.  
“Meh. Sure. Why not?” 

Solider already hated them. Besides being violent criminals, murders, kidnappers, and grotesque in both their natures, they were rude and sloppy. Something that as someone as straight laced and strict as Solider was never going to let fly. Well, Junkrat knew they weren’t going to be friends. None of them would lost sleep over it. 

Soldier threw a thick envelop at them, which in it’s own right was so outdated, they compared it to crotchety hero and they sniggered together like a couple of high school drop outs. The envelope gave them instructions on where to go, on what days, and what phrases to say to which people, and they ended up in an underground bunker that lead further down to what was the medical center for Overwatch back up above ground. They were both too turned around and actually figure out where they were, not that it mattered once they did the deed and stepped into onto the clean polished tiled floors. 

And now here they were. Some sort of Overwatch ‘base’. It sounded stupid, almost like it was out of a comic book, but that’s what it was. It seemed to be a hodgepodge of a private hospital wing that once they turned down one especially long hallway, came to a control center. There were hundreds of computer screens, and a hand full of people on headsets. Emergency callers by the looks of it. They all had matching patches of a stylized “O” on their white jacket’s shoulders. News feeds from every country in the world played everything from live hostage situations, the red ticker at the bottom telling the viewer that Overwatch was on it’s way, to a neighborhood reporting that their book drive for the homeless was going well. Junkrat caught one of the operators who spoke English saying “Heroes are on their way. Please stand by.”

He rolled his eyes. It really was like a comic book. It felt like a movie set. He didn’t like it. He wanted to be outside in the open, and do things his own way, with no rules or contracts to sign. But then again, that promise of that money was just too tempting. Maybe one of those operators would say HE was on the way, and like a super hero, he would show up and somehow save the day. Being here maybe wouldn’t be so bad. It would be a nice change of pace to not have to wake up every 20 minutes, just to check to make sure he and Roadhog were still the only ones in their hideout. The dumb hog didn’t even appreciate the fact that Junkrat kept watch at night. No, nobody asked him too, but that’s what happens when you claw your way out of a dismayed Outback with only one leg. You tend to be always awake, always watching over your shoulder. Roadhog’s presence at least gave him an hour or two in between those jerk-wake-up-check-go-back-to-sleep-jerk again-sessions. 

Junkrat looked up and saw catwalks crisscross each other all up into the darkness of the high ceiling. There were more people on them, more people in white trench coats, more computer screens. It was just a hive of soft whispers and mutters, and never ending images and charts on glowing screens. With all this space, Junkrat was starting to think it was getting stuffy in here. The more they walked the more he was getting agitated that the familiar weight of his bomb vest was missing. He noticed Roadhog kept clenched and unclenching his hand, breaking his knuckles over and over, he was also missing the weight of his scrape gun or hook and chains around his belt. This place could use a swift clearing, maybe just a little bomb…only a little one. Mercy’s supple voice lurched Junkrat out of his warm and explosive fantasy. 

“Ah, _Herr Winston_. _Ursäkta mig_. Pardon me. May we interrupt?” Mercy called out to a group of men at the end of the catwalk. It ended with one of the largest screens in the whole room, a large map of a rotating Earth and a list of names that ran up it’s side. Junkrat noticed one of the names that scrolled by.

“Of course, of course Mercy. You never interrupt. Lucio, good afternoon. And you two must be one Jamison Fawkes and one Mako Rutledge. Welcome! Welcome!”

Junkrat looked away from the screen and turned to the low and joy filled voice. The men in the coats parted, excusing themselves as they went back the way Mercy had lead them. When they left, all that was left at the end of the walk way was an enormous gorilla in freshly polished white armor, a shield generator unit in one of his hands. 

Junkrat looked up at Roadhog, who in turn looked down at him and they both nodded in agreement that they were indeed seeing this, and they were not, in fact, both having a fever dream. The doctor’s doing their examinations may have slipped them something, a microscopic needle maybe? Possible. But not likely. But then again, it was hard to wrap their rotting brains around what they were actually seeing. 

Winston was an extraordinary scientific achievement. Not only did he break the bounds of molecular biology, but the advancements he brought to zoology, botany, and genetics were like the world had never seen before.  
Junkrat seemed to sum up all of his magnificents and glory with;

“Yooura bloody big monkey.” 

He said it with pure astonishment, however, as he would later argue that he wasn’t being rude, but on the contrary. Junkrat thought Winston was, quote, ‘A fuckin’ ‘bute’. His mouth was at first slightly agape, and then it curved into a boyish smile when Winston _spoke_. Those beady little eyes roaming around the fine specimen’s whole being. He was truly excited to see a wild childhood like dream taking place before him. A –talking- animal. 

“Ha, well, I’m not a ‘monkey’.” He said politely while adjusting a pair of thickly framed glasses on his flat nosed animal face. His voice was deep and soothing, and matched his smooth and huge armored body perfectly. The white armored gorilla always did that motion when someone, unknowingly, referred to him as a ‘Cercopithecidae’, or in layman's terms, a ‘monkey’. The sheer size of him made him a worthy specimen, he was no doubt a good 600 pounds, and was at eyelevel with the tall Aussie. And this must have been after all the extermination that was done to him. Winston was, in short, an amazing sight to behold. He extended a hand, that was nearly twice the hand of Roadhog’s own, and offered it first to Junkrat, who didn’t take it, and then to Roadhog, who also didn’t take it. He let it hang in midair for a moment. His smiling face, seeping down a bit.

To his side, Junkrat looked over to see Lucio pointing and nudging his head towards Winston, coughing up the words ‘coughshakecoughhandcoughshake’ through clamped teeth. Eyes wide, thick brows scrunched down. Mercy by his side, mimicking him wit teeth gritted in a forced smile, large blue eyes darting to Winston’s hand and back to Junkrat’s stupid and confused face. 

Oh. Right. Gotta be nice to the man who was going to be signing their paychecks, he guessed. He put forward his skinny arm, Winston’s smile bouncing back into place, and they shook hands. Winston’s hand almost covered up Junkrat’s metal forearm and by the force and grip of his handshake, he knew immediately that Winston could rip off his whole arm in a quick flick of his wrist. One little tug from the massive animal and Junkrat would need a whole new arm. The metal of his arm would crushed like a soda can, the rest of his boney self quick to follow if needed. Saying hello to Roadhog wasn’t needed after Junkrat was flung a little up and down in greetings from Winston, but the armored creature nodded to him. Roadhog nodded back and a low grumble came from beneath the leather wrapped around his face. It was how two huge creatures, beast and man, greeted each other apparently. 

Junkrat’s back shot straight up. His brain making the connection that this ape was the voice both he and Roadhog heard over the private messages they had been receiving over the past few months. The one who asked for them to join Overwatch.

“Hold it just a tick. Are you …like, in charge? Is the boss man of this merry band of half mechanical men a giant monkey? ‘At’s all fine and dandy wit us,” Junkrat swiveled his thumb between himself and Roadhog, “but, what, ‘yer- OOF!”

Junkrat’s ash stained face was smashed in the metal grated floor as someone’s foot stepped onto the back of his head, and sent him propelling into the floor. Roadhog’s attention was caught too late, and whoever managed to assault the other Ex-Junker, was lucky there weren’t in reach of the enforcer’s grip.

“Some bodyguard you are, you useless brute!” Junkrat said, his hand cradling his bruised nose as he got up to one knee and rocked on it to push himself up. He sprang back up just as fast as he fell, and held his scowl for the rest of the meeting. He was going to pay back the asshole to sucker punched (jumped?), him ten-fold. Roadhog would land a good punch in there too, only because whenever someone managed to land a hit on Junkrat, it made him look bad too.  
The room remained with just them still, two doctors, two Ex-Junkers and a scientist, until Winston’s confused features turned into an annoyed and angry look. A parent that just couldn’t believe their child just hit someone else’s kid for no other reason other than wanting attention.

The silverback looked up into empty air and firmly shouted out the assaulter’s name. 

“Tracer!” He barked. Junkrat did a classic double take when a too thin young girl in obnoxiously yellow spandex phased into existence. Like summoning a genie, she wasn’t there, and then she suddenly was. She stood assured and proud of herself by Winston’s side, her glowing chest piece looked like a perfect target to try and aim for, thought Junkrat. Though her confident back curled down when she put on a pouty face and exasperatedly whined, “The arse called you a monkey, mate! Twice!”

“Well he ain’t a fackin’ flamingo!” Raged the demolition expert, charging towards her. Roadhog not about to hold him back. If anything, Roadhog himself was on the defense now and would jump in if a brawl between all the heroes and them was about to break out in the cramped walking deck. Great first impressions. 

Junkrat had little to zero qualms about getting into fist fights with women. He lost that part of his moral code long ago. Women weren’t anything special to him. They weren’t something that he wanted to protect or be delicate around. Not when all he wanted to protect was his own backside. When those half crazed femmies tried to claw his eyes out for whatever meager water supply he had on him back in the Outback, Junkrat learned all too quickly that a pair of really nice knockers meant nothing when they held a rusty piece of scrap metal behind their backs, ready to jab it into your eye socket when you came too close.

He held up his hand and Tracer, although quick to anger, was just as quick to defuse. She huffed, for Winston’s sake, not her’s, and crossed her arms sternly. Having Tracer and Junkrat get in a fight would not do. It would raise Winston’s blood pressure after all. 

“ _Godhet_. Goodness. Why is everyone taking shots at Jamison today.” Mercy said.

“Both of you, please! Tracer, you know I appreciate it when you ‘correct people’ on my behalf, but what did I tell you about being so unnecessary upset about it?’

She looked a little embarrassed. Either it was from being scolded by an animal that had better manners than her, or because she wasn’t being praised with her swift action and strong loyalty.  
“But it bothers you.” She muttered. 

Winston turned back to Junkrat, his good willed smile pulling back his thick black lips, exposing his sharp long teeth. “I apologize.” 

Junkrat’s scowl lifted a bit. But only a bit. Nobody had ever apologized to him, even on someone else’s behalf, for attacking him. It was strange hearing it. 

Lucio slipped over, Junkrat almost didn’t notice him until his lime green gloved hand came up to his face and checked his thrice-broken nose. It looked straight enough to earn Junkrat a reserved smile telling him “Walk it off. You’ll live, I promise.”  
Junkrat decided he was going to be the bigger person about this (even though he was already bigger than this Tracer by a good three feet and she looked like she would be fifty pounds wet). He would get her back later. Not all explosions had to be detonated immediately. Sometimes it was just as pleasurable watching the fuse burn down that long wick for a while before it hit the powder keg. 

“I want a pay increase fer the first month. Fer that littl’ stunt.” Junkrat said, instead, turning the situation for his finical benefit. Tracer looked horrified, a young punk having all their hot air sucked out of them. Her toughness was going to cost Winston. Junkrat nudged his head to his partner. 

“Him too.” 

Tracer pulled her elbow up, her leather jacket crinkling up, as she readied herself to try and take a swing at Junkrat’s mug. “You bastard-“

Again, Winston stopped her, hand up, blocking her from advancing and said, “This isn’t about money, Junkrat.”

Junkrat threw back his head and cackled uncontrollably. Now that was funny. Winston snorted. He held his poise, adjusting his glasses again.

“Let us head to my personal quarters, and allow me to explain all of this.” He gestured to the buzzing and humming facility. 

“And even thought you’ve now met, not in the particular way I would have liked, this is Tracer, one of Overwatch’s finest Hero, pilots, and one of your new teammates.” Winston presented her proudly. She lolled her head over, those short brown spikes of hair flopping down in front of her goggles. 

“Fook off, yeah?” She said to them, fake smile and squinting eyes ruining her normal air of positiveness and joy that she usually wore. 

“Oi! You fawk off, ye dumb cun-“

“Yo!” Lucio pipped in and took two long swipes over to the young girl. She looked like she was no older than fifteen. Maybe that’s why she had such a mouth on her. “Girl, come here, what is going on with you?” He asked, his arm over her shoulders as he lead her down the walk way. Junkrat caught the tears that was on the edge of her eyes behind her protective eyewear. She rammed her shoulder against Junkrat’s, Lucio grabbed her arm and pulled her away as they passed them, whispering hoarsely that she needed to take it down a notch. Junkrat raised a fist up when they passed, ready to land it squarely in the back of her head. But he stopped himself and settled for sticking his tongue out at the brat instead. 

This was why kids shouldn’t be in adult gatherings like this, Junkrat thought. They can’t hold their shit together. Winston and Mercy exchanged looks, but the medical officer could only offer a shrug. If Winston didn’t know what was wrong with her, she was in an even darker room than him. Something must have happened. Tracer was never this rude to people, let alone fellow new heroes, and certainly couldn’t all have been for just one offhand monkey comment.

Winston started to say sorry again, on Tracer’s behalf, again, and Junkrat cut him off. 

“Look, I doon’t care.” He pointed up to Roadhog. “This big guy doon’t care ‘ither. We don’t give two shits about some moody girl on her period. What we all care about is, what the hell we gotta do around here get paid.” 

Junkrat smiled and it wasn’t friendly. It was greedy and wanting. He spared a glance at Mercy who held her own composer well. She stared back at him. Winston cleared his throat. He had hopped these two would be a touch more friendly, but due to all the crisis around the world that were happening right now, he couldn’t afford to be picky when it came to having extraordinary people in their fields to agree to help them, and in turn, help mankind. 

Junkers wanted money. Ex-Junkers wanted money along with respect, acknowledgment, and special treatment. It was something Winston would have to deal with in stride.

“Very well.” Winston turned to the computer and brought up mission files. “Let’s throw you two into the fire.”

“Oh yes.” Junkrat said rubbing his hands together, his pale tongue running across his one gold tooth. Roadhog slapped his tattooed stomach and gurgled out his approval. 

“Oh yes, please.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Kiddiwinks is a slang term for children/kids in Australian. 
> 
> Awww, Tracer babe, what's the maaaaatter. More to come! Thanks for sticking around!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I've developed an unhealthy love for Zenyatta. I need to figure out how to work him into the next chapter...  
> Oh well. Enjoy!

Once back in her private room at the base, Tracer pulled away from Lucio. The automatic metal door slid shut and with his arms akimbo, he waited. When he let the Brit’ go, she stomped to the other side of the room leaping effortlessly over a chair and an ottoman in her path. The Overwatch facility was an odd mixture of military style bunkers, and yet each room for the Heroes was costumed to each induvial and they felt more like private hotel rooms. None of the Heroes lived here, but sometimes it felt more like a frat house than a proper government building. Or it used to, before they disbanded all those years ago. 

Tracer and Mercy were the only two that rarely left the grounds to go ‘home’, unless they were away on mission. Winston of course always stayed huddled up in his labs all while Athena kept a close cybernetic eye one him. Leaving the rest of the ‘regulars’ to drop in and out whenever they pleased. Tracer used to love seeing the halls with the Heroes, but lately it’s been so rare to have more than a handful of them all in one area. It seemed Lucio was starting to hang around more and more, swearing that it wasn’t permanent, and Tracer shouldn’t get her hopes up. And yet, here he was, three weeks into his “post-concert” schedule, helping wherever he could and being able to say good morning to her as they shared cereal bowls over an old vid recording of D.Va’s game playing channel. 

And after the awful mission turn-out she just had, she was hoping to come ‘home’ to Winston and Lucio to be there for her. Instead, as she darted past the medical staff and other officials up those steel ramps, knowing Winston would be at the head computer of the base. But then she came upon the backsides of a too-tall scarecrow-lookin-pirate with wild hair and sickly blacked skin, the other, a mammoth of a man whose weight was somehow NOT breaking the midair ramps. They were both covered in tattoos, cameo print and mismatching dirty armor pieces. It only took her half a second to see the skinny guy’s mark of the Junkers on his pants, and the other fat one’s tattoo of that sinister smiley face with crossed out eyes. They were Junkers, and Junkers were not known for their clean personal records and gentleman like manners. And they were chatting it up happily with Winston…and the wisp of a man couldn’t stop calling Winston a bloody monkey, so she, literally, jumped into the conversation to oh-so kindly correct him.

All good that did her was rile up her already troubled mood, even though it felt great to smash a criminal’s ugly face into the floor, she was scorned for her hot tempered actions. Winston became cross with her, and now, like a kid, she was being escorted back to her room. 

Tracer groaned, annoyed with everything and slumped against the wall near the room’s closed balcony door. Her arms crossed in front of her chronal accelerator, protecting it, listing to it’s low hum as it’s mechanics spun and it kept her grounded. Literally. She heard Lucio shuffle somewhere behind her and she was glad he wasn’t jumping on her just yet to poke at what was causing her to act so unlike herself. 

Tracer’s room was neat and tidy, the Ex-Air Force cadet in her never allowed her bed to be unmade or let her keep an empty glass on the counter for too long. Her walls were decorated with glass framed posters of Overwatch news clippings from back in the day and a few post cards from where her missions took her to all sorts of grand places around the world. The ones that lived on her fridge were her favorite ones, London and France. Her small room’s preferred space was that large balcony, in case she ever needed to just GO. If she ever felt trapped, or with little room to run, she could just slide open the glass door and bolt. She would hit the runways of the small private jets that were housed on the property and then beyond that, wild and dense forest.  
She couldn’t take just staring outside anymore and threw that balcony door open, as if she couldn’t get any air into her lungs, and she threw her hands onto the railing and braced herself against the cool air. Breathing in deep breaths through her nose, and out her mouth, the memory of her mission was stirring up again, and all of a sudden she was back there again, back in Scotland, back inside the burning building. 

She said quickly and loudly enough for Lucio to hear and loud enough to distract herself from her own thoughts. “First off, Winston is not a monkey.”

The other medic on the base had made himself comfortable on the white couch in the middle of the little living—like-area and plopped down. Steel reinforced couch legs held all of Lucio’s metal body weight as he sunk down into the cushions. He tucked a pillow under his chin and allowed Tracer to ramble. 

“Girl, I know this. But not everyone knows tha-.”

“Monkeys have tails.”

“Aaaaaaaaand maybe trying to face plant an on-edge convict miiiiight not be the best way to go about relaying this information? Junkers can get awful territorial and appreciative. Last thing you want is one of those guys constantly giving you the death glare, huh? Or slipping a land mind under your foot.”

Tracer dropped her arms. She turned back to stare the bleeding colors of the sky. The night was fighting to take whatever little light remained of the day. The reds and yellows fading into purples and blues. Stars peeked their heads out far, far above them.  
“I know wot they are, ye know…” Tracer said quietly into the breeze. She looked tired and like she aged in the past ten minutes. Time was always messing with her, making her feel like she was unraveling. Sometimes she panicked she didn’t know if this moment was happening in the now, or if it already did and she had jumped forward or backward without even realizing it. 

“What –who- is –what-?” Lucio asked quietly back. 

“The Junkers. I know that they _are_. And I think ‘is fair that I can be a bit peeved off about it.” 

“Aaaaaaaaand what _are_ they?” 

Lucio knew what a Junker was. First off, he knew they weren’t nightcrawlers, as some of the world had _some_ how begun to believe. He knew they were all dangerous and delusional, some clearly more than others. But honestly, when you got down to it, they were just thugs, who unfortunately after the fusion core in Australia went off, developed an utter lack of fear and reasoning. King Pins and Gang Lords took advantage of the young bloods, and fed into their paranoia that the rest of the world was out to hunt them down. So if they served the boss’s and followed their, and only their orders, they would all be rewarded if not in this life, than certainly in the next. They would always be protected, too. Brothers in arms, until a brother wanted to rip off your arm and claim in for their own. They scrapped for metal and anything that could be sold or traded for and they left little room for anyone to argue with them. Tensions between the gangs were so high, the rest of the world turned a bit of a blind eye to them, allowing them to figure it out on their own, in the Outback. Or what was left of it anyway. 

Lucio read up on both Jamison and Mako only this morning, or what wasn’t blackened out in their medical files, when he was told they would be officially joining Overwatch if they passed their physical exams. Was he surprised? He had seen crazier things. He was more gob smacked at the sight of the two, rather than then shocked about their pasts. Personally Lucio had heard of them before glimpsing over their files, he, and the rest of the world had heard of the famous King’s Row heist. Those two knuckle-headed convicts somehow stole the Queen’s Jewels and as the reports said, just road away into the sunset, emeralds and diamonds falling out of their get-a-way side car and into the streets. The DJ tisked at himself for forgetting to ask Junkrat and Roadhog just what did they DO with the jewels afterwards. The newspapers failed to report on it, and it left the English Police look incompetent and foolish. The Queen, that old mummy, didn’t seem to care that over 50 million pounds was swiped from under her nose. The Queen of England cared about very little in her old age. After World War IIII, she had stopped taking interest in the world’s happenings. 

The Queen of England didn’t care for the rowdy Junkers, but Tracer apparently did. Tracer huffed and puffed. 

“…Murders! The worst kind of cons. Wot does EX even MEAN. Wot, you kill a bunch of poor sods, and wot, wot, you’re welcomed to the family. ‘Oh, come! Please come and join Overwatch! IT’’LL BE GREAT, LOVES. CHEERS!!’” Tracer mimicked Winson’s deep voice poorly, and pivoted on her foot as fast she could when she was done shouting. She slammed her measly weight down next to Lucio on the couch, buried her head in cushion and screamed into it. Lucio placed a hand on his back and let it rest there. She stayed hidden in the pillow. She had disappeared before, and it was horrifying. She never even expressed the saying “wanting to disappear” ever again after those insane few weeks where she faded in and out of reality. But she sure did feel low, and wanted to at least escape from everything for a minute. 

“Wot’s Winston thinkin’.”

Lucio craned his neck side to side and leisurely smiled when his spine popped. 

“He was thinking, probably, and I ain’t claiming I know how he thinks or nothin’, buuut I’m thinking that HE thinks it’s better to have two neutral hitmen on our side for good, rather than having them run around the world all willy nilly on some big bad gang boss’s payroll instead.”

Tracer crossed her arms and sank back against the couch. One long leg crossed over the other and she bounced it speedily. 

“And THOSE two are the best he could find?”

Lucio nodded coolly, slowly. “Yuuup. Or have you not noticed there’s kinda more bad guys out there, than good guys now a days. Winston’s just trying to even out the playing field a bit.” 

Tracer could have argued with Lucio over Junkrat’s and Roadhog’s rap sheets for hours. They could have easily dove into a deep conversation over moral codes, and standings, and what it meant to have a past and what made a man a good one when he tried to change. Tracer didn’t know the other two of course, but she would bet any of her personal possessions, that those two didn’t have any intention to ‘change’. They just wanted a steady paycheck. If Winston asked them to go assistant the Queen of England, they would. If he asked them to save a kitten from a tree, they would. As long as the cash flow kept coming their way, it didn’t matter to them. And that made them very dangerous. The other’s on the team at least had something to prove. Something to obtain, in either the form of forgiveness, closure, redemption... SOMETHING. Junkrat and Roadhog had nothing. 

Overwatch was supposed to make the world a better place. It did. It IS. But it wasn’t doing it fast enough and even now the world was still in trouble. Beggars couldn’t be choosers. Tracer just wished Winston hadn’t decided to choose the very bottom of the gun barrel. 

“I know you’re goingtta say I need to give them a chance.”

“Wasn’t gonna say that.”

“Or you’re goingtta say everyone deserves to turn over a new leaf.”

“Nu uh, wasn’t gonna say that either.”

“Or convince me that I need to go say ‘I’m sorry’.”

“You are so bad at this guessing game.”

“But ya know what, I’m not sorry! I ain’t, Lucy. I ain’t!” 

He cut her short, a very serious and stern look at his face. When Lucio wasn’t smiling, even just a little, the world felt wrong. She looked away from him when he frowned at her seriously. 

“I was gonna say, I want to know what made you tell the other guy to ‘fuck off’. Lena Oxton, you, of all people, do not lose your cool like that. From one cool person to another, that wasn’t cool of you. And don’t tell me it’s just cause you saw Ex-Junkers in the base. What happened out there, before you dropped back in?” 

She cringed. Hard. Hearing someone as charming and easy going as Lucio swearing was incredibly juddering. She couldn’t even recall the last time a foul word like that ever came out of him, except the time he couldn’t stop saying “dammit” when they were caught under heavy fire from Talon that one time they were both in Whales. Plus he used her full name.

Her head peeked out from the edge of the pillow and Lucio watched as her eyes glazed over again with a wet sheen. 

“Come here, Tracer.” He said, offering her to come into his open arms. 

She was stronger than this. She hated this. But she couldn’t deny the comfort that was being offered to her as her mind’s eye played the screaming people’s faces that were swallowed by flames and smoke.  
Tracer flopped sideways and Lucio enveloped her in his strong armed embrace. She sniffed, her nose digging itself into his brightly colored tank top. 

“You know I never cry.”

“That is true. That is why you are worrying me, girl. What’s up? Tell Dr. Feels –“

“Do not call yourself Dr. Feels Good All The Time.” Her soft voice was strained, but edged with a laugh that she was fighting against. He patted her arms with both hands, she could feel him smirking above her. 

“Soooo…” 

Tracer leaned up a little, her orange glazed goggles looked past his green visor and she looked down at the rug. She breathed, and then let her head rest against his chest. 

“I lost five of them.”

Lucio was quick to respond. “Tracer, you know that we can’t save them all. That’s not how this works.”

“No. No, it’s not just that. It’s…” She pulled away from him, straightening up and staring out into the sky again. More stars had come out. 

“I choose not to save ‘em.” 

“Huh?”

“I couldn’t. I tried so hard, but I had to pick one or the other, and then I jumped and recalled back in time I thought I figured out the perfect pattern, but then I lost the other group of ten, the whole place was coming down, McCree was on another level,-“  
“Trace, hold on, deep breaths, you’re going to hyperven-“

“-I tried to spin back to his point too, but by then I would have lost the whole floor if I did that, so I jumped back and forth and I couldn’t hold my ground any longer, the ceiling was coming down and…” 

Her hyper rant died down, her wild wide eyes scanning nothing before her but the memory inside her own head. She was speaking so quickly and dropping so many letters, even Lucio had to strain to keep up with her story. But then she looked back at him, finely trimmed eyebrows knitted up. She refused to let the tears fall down. Through a clenched throat she finally said, “I picked who to save, Lucy.” 

To save ten she had to lose five. To save fifteen she would have lost the rest of the floor and who knows who else. Playing with space and time was never an exact science. Tracer was burned with the decision on who to save. It would hunt her dreams, thinking if the others had seen her look at them, pass judgment and let them fall away. Or had they died never knowing she jumped back in time 36 times, saw their faces each time, before she realized she was running out of energy and they would have all perished if she tried to jump one more time. She just couldn’t get the formula to play out in her favor. She would pray in her own way that she would be granted forgiveness by them, and that the powers that be at least recognized her for the people she did end up saving. 

Lucio took a deep breath in for both of them. Everyone had their share of failed missions, situations that just spun too quickly out of their control, and of course the lives they could have saved but were seconds too late. Maybe Mercy and Lucio shared that burden the most of the team, being the medics (even unofficially) carried the weight, no, the promise, that no matter how hard you try to save a life, it can and will just slip through your fingers. No matter what. Tracer knew what it meant to be a hero. It meant to protect those who couldn’t save themselves, and to help those who reached out for it. No matter who, all the members of Overwatch during, or after and lost those they promised to save. 

Certainly Tracer was no stranger to that. It was impossible to have a perfect record in this type of work. But Lucio had never been in the situation where he had to pick a person in need over another. 

“I’m sorry to hear that.” 

There was nothing more to say. Even that would bring her no comfort. All she could do was say sorry to families and friends that were waiting for at the base of the building, now completely engulfed in fire as it started to collapse. Firemen dosed it with an endless water supply and when Tracer jogged up to McCree, both cover head to toe in ash and grim, he looked grimily at her, then at the building, then back over to the surviving pedestrians. The Bounty Hunter had given up his poncho to a couple who huddled in the red cape like it was a force field, his own hat seared at the edges with a tiny hole in the brim. Thanks to a random ember spark that floated down to it AFTER he got out of the building. 

“Just my luck.” He grumbled to himself. Tracer said nothing. 

When she had returned to base, after hours of checking over victims, and just standing there alongside McCree around the burned down rubble, (as the head of the Police asked them to. Just so people could see that Overwatch came to help so as to put the people at ease, and to look good for the camera’s when the news crews showed up, of course. Symbol of hope and what-not.), she methodically wondered straight for Winston. Head hanging down in some bizarre feeling of shame she had no right to be feeling, her eyes glued to the ground. Then she heard the word “monkey, not once but twice, and well, the rest of her day just continued going downhill from there. 

Luico chimed in again, gently. “But I’m sure the ones you did save are forever grateful.” 

She nodded absent mindedly and signed. Lucio patted her on the back one more time and stood up. The weight of the cushions dramatically shifted and it made Tracer look at him.  
“Where are you headed of to, love?” 

He pumped his legs back and forth, gliding himself back to the door. His wired finger tips touched the bulky radio on the side of his head. 

“You do what you gotta do, Trace. Stay here, or don’t. Think about the mission, or don’t. But Mercy just chimed me. Looks like Winston finished up his debriefing with Junkrat and Roadhog. They’re about to be sent out, and she needs an extra pair of hands on the medical floor when they do.” 

“Oh.”

His hand touched the keys to the door and it opened up with a hydraulic hiss. 

He smiled, even though he was already facing the hallway. “I think I’ll go wish those two dudes good luck. Always good karma to wish someone else good fortune. Maaaaaybe it’ll be good if you did too.”

Tracer UGH’ed so hard Lucio couldn’t help but cough up a laugh. She chucked a couch pillow at the back of his thick dreads. She hung off the back of the couch and pouted her thin lips.

“You just want me to go apologize.” 

“Hey like I said, you gotta do what you gotta do. But sometimes it’s nice to know there’s no bad blood in a group of good guys, huh?”

Lucio skated down the hallway and left Tracer be. He certainly did have a way with words. Maybe that’s why he was a world famous musician. Damn that suave smile of his, too. Tracer brought her knees to her chin and pounced off the back of the couch and raced through the door before it had a chance to close. 

///

Junkrat, like always, did all the chattering while he and Roadhog packed themselves up like mules with bombs, triggers, flares, chemicals, and the rest of what could flatten a neighborhood real quick like. They were given back their gear, plus loads extra (it was like Christmas times ten) and they started grabbing stuff that they didn’t even know what they were. The Overwatch weaponry was shiny and new and none of the blasters or gun powder cases were cracked. Not like all their own gear that had been used and reused for how many years now. 

Junkrat was pleased to see all the new knick knacks, but in the end it really didn’t matter. After a few hours with them, it was all going to be broken, splintered, and baked into one lovely booby trapped pie before the sun set. They would make sure of that.  
Roadhog slung on his vest, checking every pocket as he did, an odd habit he had developed over the years, Junkrat had noticed. Like he was rutting around for something in them, even though he knew for a fact what pocket had within. Junkrat did the same and held his own vest close to him, his flesh hand running over the yellow and silver canisters along each side of it. That happy little Junker smiley face beaming up at him from each bomb. 

When he slipped it on and grinned, he looked over at Roadhog and they gave each other a thumbs up. Strange how they were going to go on this so-called-mission and NOT go in guns blazing. Winston made that very clear as they were shown digital photos of a very large gathering of normal looking citizens in Iceland. 

“Right. So we go there, and we blow up all those Talon folks to smithereens. Holy doodly, there’s a lot of them. Just all sittin’ out in the open like that? Not a smart bunch of terrorists, are they? Gatherin’ in droves like that…in broad daylight. But no worries! Nothin’ me and his lovely hog of man can’t handle.” 

Winston pitched the bridge of his flat nose. 

“NO.” He said, for what must have been the third time. “THOSE are the citizens.” The gorilla’s thick armored finger pointed to what was clearly a group of peaceful civilians, some on picnic blankets on a grassy knoll. 

“And THAT,” he pointed to the stage the photo enhanced in on. “Is where Sharon Walker will be giving her annual speech to the city. She’s one of the most influential business women in the country and her own company is worth millions in leading solar power.”

“Right. So we blow only her up. Stop her from stealing the sun. Keep casualties to a minimum. Got it.” Mercy had to cover her mouth up with her own hand as to not give away her laughter. She quickly coughed to cover it up when Winston shot her a “Don’t you encourage them” look.

“NO. SHE’S the one you need to protect AGAINST Talon. We picked up tips and information from the past months that there might be, keyword being ‘might’, a hit on her from Talon’s members. Talon isn’t known for going after small fish like her, but she’s got enough high connections. One things leads to another, and after a domino effect happens, the next thing we know Talon is controlling all of Earth’s nuclear reactors. Imagine the whole world become like your Outback. Even if there’s a .0000001% chance of it happening, we have to try and stop it.” 

Winston stated everything so matter of factly, Junkrat could actual see that all happening. 

“I need you two to take this very seriously. There might not even be a litter bug at this little gathering, but if it suddenly turns, _you two_ might be the only thing standing in the way of a whole world melt down crisis.” 

Junkrat felt important. Real important. He perked up. It was bit jarring to see the skinny man straighten up. It was a strange optical illusion, one moment he was hunched over and looked to be only 5’6, and then when he sprang up like a daisy in the winter time, suddenly he was well over 6 foot. That crooked smile of his didn’t help his crazed demeanor one bit. Junkrat threw up his metal clad hand into a salute and stuck his long nose into the air. 

“You can count on us, sir!” Roadhog just nodded once. Winston smiled, as did Mercy. When Winston was called away on other matters, he wished them luck and his long arms rose up above his head and he snagged onto a metal beam. Winston threw his weight from side to side and very naturally made his exit while swinging from beam to beam. Junkrat laughed. You can make a gorilla into a scientist, but you can’t take the gorilla out of the scientist. It was still a sight to behold. 

Mercy beckoned the two men to follow her once more and she lead them to a storage area that held all their junk. She stood back and watched silently as the hired guns started to build up on their bulk of gadgets and armor. Junkrat caught her in the corner of his eye, a white splotch against the cold metal walls. 

“So,” he asked while checking over a hand held triggering device. “How come he ain’t sending you out to this ‘up-most-important’ mission thing.”

“I am needed here. Elsewhere later. We cannot be in two places at once, as much as I would like that.” 

When Junkrat slipped on his vest, Mercy’s clacking heels sounded like they were getting closer to him. When he looked up, she stood before him, her head just barely passing his collar bones. She grabbed the top left of his vest and gave a tug back, to the side and then tightened the strap there. 

“Ah. There. Much better. You looked like you were slightly swimming in it.” Mercy bowed her head down at him and at Roadhog, who watched her closely as she came upon Junkrat.

“Best of luck you two. I await your return without incident. _Hejdå för nu_. Goodbye for now.” She let herself out and almost got run over by Lucio and Tracer as she did. 

”Yo! Heads up!” Lucio said and skated right past her and almost right past the Ex-Junkers. He kept up his speed, gliding effotlessly around them in a circule like he was at a roller rink. 

”Good luck you two! Catch ya later!” And he was gone just as quickly as he was here. Junkrat smiled at the friendlyness but when he saw that Tracer was now the only one left, his smile dropped. Her, he could do without. 

Mercy, still pressed up against the wall, blinked and then said to Tracer, “ _Ah, väldigt bra_. Ah, very good. No medical attention is needed, I see you are feeling better?” 

“All aces ‘ere.”

Mercy nodded once more and left Tracer alone with the Junkrat and Roadhog. She wouldn’t have done so if she didn’t have a feeling it would all turn out for the better. Or at least without someone’s nose being broken. Junkrat and Roadhog wouldn’t be able to catch Tracer anyway. Now just as long as they didn’t set off a bomb…

“Good luck!” She blurted out joyfully. “And um, well, I’m sorry, loves.” Tracer said and stepped right up to Junkrat, who very obviously was trying to not make eye contact with her. She bent this way and that, trying to follow his gaze, her hands behind her back, suddenly all rosy checked and cheery. 

“ _Love_?” He ricocheted back at her, face twisted up into something ugly. His nostril flared up when he said the word, his eyes squinting as if the word was a rotting piece of flesh, long expired, the maggots having eaten all the good stuff already, as it’s stench wafted through the stale and recycled air around them. 

“A bloody second ago ya almost broke me sneezer, and told me to fawk right off. Or do ya not remember the past, oh I dunno, ten minutes? I hear ya control time. All that time jumping seems ta be messin' with yer brain.” 

She smiled as best she could, while also feeling bad. But she wasn’t going to be baited by him. This was not primary school. She straightened, determined.

“I was having a bad day. I’m still having it.”

“And I’ve had a bad life. I win, kiddo.”

He was in ZERO position to call HER a kiddo. Under the ash and permanent glare, Junkrat looked no older than Tracer herself. 

She went on. He may not have been listening but it was all she could do to try at this point. Otherwise Lucio would never let here the end of it. “I ‘ad no right to take it out on you. Or anybody. I’m a big girl. And big girls don’t do that. Not to their, uh..well, their new teammates.”

Junkrat decided to ignore the young women again, instead, his long fingers looped around his loose shoe lace and triple knotted his lone boot, and tucked the strings inside. Then Roadhog reminded everyone he was still in the room and slammed a carrying case full of gunpowder and flints. Tracer jumped at the sudden bang. Sometimes people forgot he was there, even though he took up half the space of most rooms. His eerily quiet nature off the battle grounds could make him disappear very easily. Tracer looked just beyond Junkrat’s slumped back and saw Roadhog. Really saw him. She had spent her whole life next to fighter jets, and even now Winston, the largest animal she’s ever touched, but there was something about Roadhog. There may not have been a proper word in all of the Queen’s English to really describe just how unnaturally large and tall the man really was. Was it drugs? Radiation? Science gone a-muck? Tracer could only guess, but she also couldn’t help but stare, a little slacked jawed. 

Junkrat cleared his throat, picking up on his partner’s irritation prickling. Junkrat didn’t like being stared at, and he certainly didn’t like it when people stared at Roadhog like they were some sideshow features. A world full of half cyborgs and mismatched humans a-like and yet everyone out there still somehow managed to make them feel like outcasts. When his phlegm actually caught, he threw back his head and spat a thick and foamy loogie over Tracer’s head. She was so disgusted, she forgot all about Roadhog for a moment. 

“Rude! THIS,” She said, popping a hip and pointing to the clean and slightly Pinesal smelling tiles of the floor. “is NOT the Outback.”

“Coulda fooled us.” He mumbled, Roadhog muffling something in agreement behind them. Just hearing her say the word, Outback, made him become antsy. The enclosed metal sheets and bolts of a military base around him were starting to close in. He wanted dirt, rocks, sky, more dirt, more rocks, and fresh air more now than ever. When was the last time he and Roadhog were INSIDE a building for this long without it being rigged to blow in six seconds flat? 

Even though Tracer said it, that thick Cockney accent of her’s ruined the word ‘Outback’ and sounded more like if someone swished a boom against some beer bottles. ‘AaautBECK.’ Junkrat now had another reason to dislike her. She didn’t say things like he liked. He murdered blokes for less… 

Roadhog nodded at Junkrat, growling out a low “Don’t wait up.” and trudged past the two of them and down the hall. With every step he took with his steel toed boots, Tracer thought she was physically vibrating. She picked at invisible dust around her jacket’s fur collar. 

“Soooo, we’re ok? Cheers, and wot not, yeah?”

Junkrat gave one more look over at this Tracer lady. She eagerly shifted her weight from one foot to the other, hands clasped in a childish manner in front of her, gloved fingers laced tightly. All she needed to do was dig the tip of her toe into the ground and she would be the picture perfect little angel. Hoping against hope that maybe she would receive a pat on the head and a friendly fist bump to secure that they’ll be buddies now and forever more, and have this awkward little introduction behind them. Something they would have laughed about down the road when the world was free of crime and they would all gather together as a team over paper crafts and egg nog (or whatever the hell people did in celebration and in good company. Junkrat was guessing from some holiday cards he had seen years ago scrape across the dessert ground back home). 

“You can take your little ‘cheers’ and shove it down yer *scrubber throat along wit your cuppa and biscuits.”

“Hey now! Be reasonable. Ooooh, com’on! I’m trying ta say that I’m sorry! I really am! You’re not being fair at all. Ain’t you ever been sorry for somethin’? Doesn’t feel too grand when the other person’s not saying ‘Well alrigh’ then’.” 

“I’ve never apologized to no one, mate. Sure as *piddle pop don’t have ta say ‘Okay’ ta ya, jus’ cause ya feel rotten about it. Gooud. Ya should. Ya nearly broke my bee-A-uuutiful face, thankyouverymuch.”

“So that’s it then? Welcome to the team and shove off? Have a nice life?” She crossed her arms, somehow she was either going to be forgiven or at least have the last word in. 

Junkrat pulled down his mouth corners and raised an eyebrow, a distant memory forming in his mind’s eye. So vividly in fact, he could almost taste the smell wild flowers in a coffee tin on a wood table, even though they had already begun to wilt. Two day old baked bread left next to it, sticky glass jars of different jams all opened and plundered, smeared and decorating the cotton table cloth. 

“Ya know, I asked for forgiveness once.” 

The smell of medicine, too much of it, and bed sheets that hadn’t been changed for quite some time. That bed room also had flowers in it, this time in a glass mug as they were brought in recently from the yard, a trail of dirt still on the floor leading to them, nobody bothering to sweep any of it up. 

“My ma, on her death bed.” 

The lingering scent of his mother’s unwashed long brown hair, and perfume that was stale and forever infused into her long nightgown. It all still remained strong in Junkrat’s nose, even to this day. 

“Well there ya go, love!” Exclaimed Tracer brightly. She was relieved that this crazy Aussie had at least a SHRED of human kindness in him. Maybe underneath all the madness and mayhem, he would make a better Hero then she thought.

“And she gave it to you, roight?”

The burnt blond-haired man adjusted his pipe bomb laid vest one more time. He really was swimming in it before. He fiddled with the right side strap to match whatever Mercy had down to the left. He fiddled with a wire near his shoulder and while forcing all his attention on to it, chirped out a quick “Now why the hell would she ‘ave done that?” to Tracer’s question and followed after Roadhog. His peg leg tapping the ground in an even rhythm, echoing in his wake. Tracer lost sight of him when he turned the corner, but still heard the faint tapping long after he was gone. 

Well, at least he called her ‘mate’. 

 

*Scrubber means whore/prostitute.  
*Australian slang for its own version of the American slang phrase “sure as shit”. That’s a weird phrase anyway. Oh English. You so crazy.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hi? Stop it, don't look at me like that. Enjoy this short filler for now.

A still Junkrat was a very dangerous creature to be near. 

When all that loud hyperness and intense energy is bunkered down and focused like a finally aimed sniper rifle, it’s a signal that the ex-Junker was in mood to play games. It meant that he was spring loaded, a firm hand clenched around a trigger, pinhole iris were locked onto a target, and it would only take a split second for him to throw the switch and blow himself and everything around him to high heaven, without a second thought. 

These rare moments of pure concentration only came about when he figured his life was forfeit, when there were no back stairs on the blueprint of the building or no fire escapes around the corner to jump to safety. It was when he would throw a quick glance at Roadhog and would nod a final goodbye, no point in wasting breath, and then wait for the flames to burn everything and everyone around them to ash. He always welcomed his death in those moments, a grim reaper made of holy fire, searing his flesh off his bones and drowning what was left of him in thick smoke and hot ambers. 

Right now, in the spring-like midday in Iceland, with freshly trimmed green grass and white flowers lazily blowing in the smallest hints of a breeze, Junkrat was still, and a floating omnic was in his sights. The blond man’s thumb already over the detonation button of his trigger. All it didn’t was the smallest amount of pressure to push it and they would all be obliterated. Half a second. Half a heartbeat. Half of a blink. 

The looming threat of being ripped apart into hunks of meat and metal didn’t seem to phase Roadhog, who ideally stood by the mad bomber. He just looked at Junkrat briefly, eyeing the trigger button under the other’s black painted nail, then looked at the hoovering robot who also didn’t bat an eye (if those things even had eyes) at the danger he was supposedly in. Roadhog just screeched the part of his neck where his mask ended, were it usually irritated the skin when he wore it too long. He gave the omnic one last thoughtful stare and then turned his attention back to the lady in the gray pantsuit down the hill at a polished wood podium.

Roadhog rumbled a sigh, a stuttering sound like pickup truck engine trying to turn over in the winter time. It was always loud when he exhaled out his heavy leather gas mask. He lifted a hand, his gold ringed fingers indicated which hand of his was the ‘right’ one, and grabbed the ‘snout’ end of it, giving a good wriggle from left to right. Then his thick frame leaned to the side and he rested his shoulder against the tree trunk that was providing them some shade.  
“Relax, ‘Rat.” Roadhog said, low and board.

Junkrat flinched at the sudden sound and in a whisper so hushed, Roadhog had to tilt his head closer to his partner to actually hear what Junkrat hissed out. 

“You outta ‘re head? I’ll relax when that floatin’ toaster is melted down scrap. We’ve been set up mate, nobody said nothin’ about no omnic tinker toy being here.” He shifted nervously from foot to peg.  
“Don’tcha dare tell ME to relax, you oversized oaf.” 

Junkrat tended to get if not a little mean, a little rude to Roadhog whenever omnic were near. He grew even more mean and rude when his partner in crime wasn’t backing him up and joining him in his nervousness. It made him even more nervous that Roadhog wasn’t nervous. Why was he the only one with a bomb ready to blow and a frag launcher ready to fire?

The robot perked up at the mention of ‘omnic’, those strange floating orbs around his neck lit up a notch as it spoke. It oddly sounded human with a trace of metical static to its words. Junkrat always figured omnics all sounded like they were from those old Hollywood documentaries, like The Terminator. He loved that one cause the scary German robot was crushed at the end of the first one, and then melted down in lava in the second one. He loved to reply those parts in his head whenever he saw one of them metal bodies roaming around city boardwalks. 

“Ah,” It said. (He? The voice was clearly mimicking a human male and even thought Junkrat was told his name was Zenyatta, the ex-junker wasn’t about to start calling him by his name, either) He brought his attention to the two convicts who stood in the shade of nature on this lovely day. Zenyatta had decided to spend his time on this mission in the sunlight, enjoying the feel of his metal plates heating up under the sun’s rays. 

“A toaster, I am not, but if I had the ability to make toast, then it would indeed be fair to call me such. I think my young pupil would find that very comical. He does go on fondly about food from time to time.” 

Junkrat jerked, and hard. His back snapping up straight. Without taking his eyes off Zenyatta, Junkrat screwed his mouth to the side and whispered so loudly he may has well just spoke normally, 

“How did it hear me!” He sneered to Roadhog behind him who had clearly lost interest in watching Junkrat have a non-faceoff with a peaceful monk-priest-ball juggling-omnic-thing. Seemed like he was a fellow teammate too. A fellow teammate who was acknowledging Junkrat’s little standoff fit as no more than a child’s cry for attention.

Roadhog didn’t say anything back to Junkrat. He himself didn’t give two shits about Zenyatta. He and Junkrat were going to get paid the same amount if the floating monk was there to help them play bodyguard or not. And that suited him just fine, share the work; not the cash. A mantra he could get behind. 

“I am not an ‘It’, my name is Zenyatta, as I know you know this. For I know who you, Jamison, from the files I was given when you two joined Overwatch’s cause.” Zenyatta did not turn his attention away from their assigned target, but his voice did warm up as he went on. “And as for hearing you nearly scream your whispers, I can hear up to a .749 miles radius actually. Though I choose not to, and allow all things their privacy.” 

A slim metal arm broke free from his clothed lap, long silver digits cupped he’s chin plate looking as though he was in deep thought. 

“And yet, I can’t hear inside myself, as hard as I try to listen. How strange…”

Junkrat chewed on the inside of his cheeks. Zenyatta, polite or not, witty and actually full of kind chatter, was still a filthy omnic that could, no, would, go berserk at any given moment. Junkrat wasn’t buying this peaceful monk bullshit for one second. Roadhog seemed to be eating it up, not helping him glare it down, or at least throw a sticky at it.

“Perhaps it would be wise to watch our assigned target rather than observing me?” Zenyatta offered, fingers lifting off his chin to point down to the women who would rise a choir of cheers and claps every other few sentences from the crowd in front of her. Junkrat had almost completely forgotten about her or what this whole event was even about. Not that it really mattered, this was a baby mission. The stakes of this whole stupid assignment was incredibly low. So low that Junkrat almost felt insulted that THIS was how their new employer wanted them to dip their feet in the waters. 

All of Winston’s crap about how one little thing gone wrong from this event could tip the scales of some terroristic war and bring the world to an end. The women on the stage just said something about new less energy and cost efficient lightbulbs. Yeah, total world anarchy started here, in the middle of tiny town in Iceland that half of the actual town was still a village that stocked up on wood logs for fires at night to keep warm.

“Yeh,” Junkrat says, slouching his shoulders back down, his thumb moving away from the trigger button slightly. His long neck swived to the side and he looked down at the crowd then back at the robot. 

“I bet you would like that.” 

Zenyatta hummed at this, agreeing with Junkrat at least on that. And for good measure, whether to mock the blond man or not, the humming monk threw his thumb up in approval. Junkrat hacked up a thick loogie and spat it half way were the shade of the tree top stopped and the bright sun washed out the rest of the ground. 

Junkrat leaned against Roadhog, instead of the tree itself, arms crossed over his front, real leg crossing over his fake one to appear casual and he glared just a little more at Zenyatta, his bottom lip sticking out in a pout. He tilted his head up, his messy hair pressing into Roadhog’s bare chest as he did. 

“Can you believe this thing?” He jutted his pointed chin at the serene Zenyatta, those gold and blue orbs still rotating and spinning about his metal frame care free. 

Junkrat shifted his balance when Roadhog shrugged his bulky shoulders up, still indifferent to Zenyatta. He hated omnic no less that Jamie did, but for an omnic to be dressed in traditional Tibetan monk attire, modestly, and assigned to Overwatch as an actual member and not some janitorial waste unit, well, Roadhog guessed there wasn’t much reason to waste his energy and have eyes on the back of his head just for him. No matter how much Junkrat was silently pleading with his this beady little eyes for him to crush the omnic into a tin can just so he could get a giggle out of it.

“What’s a omnic doin’ here anyway? You weren’t on the plane ride over ‘ere. What you care for if a bunch of humans get their precious solar power or whatever.” 

“Or ‘Whatever.’” Zenyatta replied easily as if that explained everything. 

Now Zenyatta was just being cheeky, but then added, “Overwatch likes to maintain a…hmmm…shall we call it “presents”, a support of sorts with fellow omnics around the world. Being one myself, I am of course the best member to go and “make face”, as they say.” The monk’s hand spread themselves under this gold plated chin, fanning themselves out like a bird preforming a mating call, to show just how adorable he could be if provoked. Junkrat thought he was going to toss his cookies at the robot’s self-awareness and sense of humor that he was not appreciating. 

“As for why I am already here, I have been stationed here while I am on the travels. You may not see me much at the base back in Sweden when this is through.” 

‘Good.’ Junkrat snapped inside his head. Then he jerked his head to the side, one wild eyebrow shooting up his ash stained forehead. 

“What other omnics?” Jamie demanded, trigger finger unbearably itchy again. Zenyatta pointed below them. Well Hell, there they were. A few omnics, but enough to make Junkrat want to blow this event up, were blending into the crow almost unnoticeably. They were hard to pick out, as they wore human hoodies, and baseball caps, but none the less, their metal limbs and bright wires were easy to see in the bright day. Junkrat had missed the one on stage completely. It was in a sharply dressed business suit, and as the mission file had stated, (not that Junkrat read it), the omnic was Mrs. Walker’s largest shareholder and business partner. Did they all know Zenyatta was here? Was it like those whale things that called out to each other telepathically? No, those were bats. Junkrat was thinking of bats....Wait, were omnic allowed to own shares? Or be in business? Before Junkrat’s train of thoughts totally went off the tracks, Zenyatta brought him back. 

“We enjoy clean fresh air as well. I believe that is what Mrs. Sharon Walker is delivering her speech about right now.” Zenyatta tried to drive Junkrat’s attention back down to the stage and resumed his watch over the happenings once more.  
With Roadhog leaving Zenyatta be, and Zenyatta remaining unbothered, feathers unruffled by Junkrat’s rude hand gestures, childish tongue-sticking-outness, or even when Junkrat resorted to throwing tiny little dust clumps at him (which those damn orbs would move quickly to block any dirt to actually hit his sleek metal frame), Junkrat huffed irritability and plopped down heavily onto his rump. Fine, he would look over the side of the hill at the lady that was still talking and pay attention to the mission. But if the omnic did anything shifty, KABOOM, Junkrat was ready to save the day. 

Junkrat looked up again, the tower of Roadhog’s unmoving frame ignored him at his feet. 

“Traitor.” Junkrat said into his palm when his elbow came up to rest on his metal knee and his hand cupped his heavy head. 

Roadhog smirked lopsidedly beneath his stitched mask and the three of them continued to listen to how oceanic current movement from the North Sea will increase solar power activity in the upcoming months. 

When the sudden applause erupted from the crowd, nothing too rowdy, this was a government gathering of a small time politician business head, not a rock concert, it still managed to startle Junkrat out of his half a sleep snooze and he shot up to his feet. Had Roadhog not anticipated Junkrat’s exact movement, knowing that the little idiot probably dozed off during the long speech, the smaller con would have hit the trigger to his bomb device already, blowing them, and the hill up to smithereens. Junkrat stared at Roadhog’s massive hand immersing his hand and trigger completely. Even Zenyatta had switched out his lotus position, to one hand up and posed to strike an orb out if necessary. 

“Oh.” Junkrat said simply when his attention zoned back into focus and he watched the lady in the pant suit wave her goodbyes to a clapping crowd and one lone bodyguard following her off the stage. The crowd of towns folk started to pick up their picnic blankets.  
“Right….Wait a tick. That’s it!?” Zenyatta returned to his meditation stance, silver palms up on his orange cloth covered knees, and he nodded. 

“Correct. I may now congratulate you both on a fine job well done on your first mission with Overwatch.” He clapped his hands together in approval and gave Junkrat and Roadhog his praise. Roadhog pushed himself off the tree and scratched at the base of where his hair was pulled back into his spike short ponytail. All this didn’t seem worth the 4 hour jet ride from headquarters, the 2 hour train ride into the town itself that wasn’t even big enough to have an airport in it, and then the 2 more hours of science babble that made both Roadhog and Junkrat’s eye cross from boredom. 

Junkrat pressed his lips together and blew a raspberry. “’Hog and I get all dolled up for the party, and it’s over before anyone even spikes the punch. I feel jipped.” 

“Would have preferred if something unfortunate happened instead?” Zenyatta said over his shoulder as he floated down a little carved out path on the hillside, the other two following up behind him. They would part ways at the fork and Junkrat would try to resist planning a sticky onto the monk’s big puffy pants. 

“Weeeeeeeeeeeeell,” Junkrat trailed off, “Woulda made for a betta story than shit nothing, eh?” 

“We got paid to stand around.” Roadhog stated, speaking a full sentence for the first time this whole day. 

“True enough, I guess. Still borin’. Next mission better have some grit to it, or we’re going back to crime. Better to be on the run from flat foot than to be driven mad with nothing to do, right?”

Roadhog snorted. 

“Right-o!”


End file.
